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Thursday, April 1, 2010

The Third Decade or Ten Years of Sh*t

People who have older siblings are lucky. Older brothers and sisters can offer advice on what to do and/or demonstrate on what not to do. I have a sister two years older and that girl was a college education on what not to do. However, in terms of advice on what to expect out of life I was pretty much on my own.

A few of my friends have turned thirty recently and I would like to offer some advice to anyone about to enter their third decade: BEWARE! You see I am old, and have been in the fourth decade for a smidgen of time. Time enough to have noted what a train wreck one's thirties can be. Oh, it isn't just me either! I have talked to several forty-somethings and there is an agreement that the thirties are fraught (yes I said it, fraught!) with danger. Let's go over a few points...TWENTIES

To understand the thirties let's understand the twenties. The twenties for many of us were like being teenagers except you can drink and have sex without getting grounded/trouble. College? Yeah... you had to do "stuff" in college, but let's be honest for many of us college was not heavy lifting; example: If you can roll into your 8AM class and the professor is happy to see you even if you stink of last night's beer(s) it's not heavy lifting. Sure, after college you have to work, but working to make sure you have enough beer/Aruba money is not a do or die situation. Which leads us to...

THIRTIES
Let's go over some of the things that will make this decade traumatic!

MARRIAGE
What? You don't plan to get married or that's a problem for the distant future? Well my friend the distant future for many of you is in this decade. So you think you've beaten the system by getting married in your twenties? Wrong! Many of you will not only get divorced in your thirties but will go and get married again in this decade! I've seen it happen.

HOME OWNERSHIP
So you've been a slob and left pizza boxes and beer bottles throughout the pigsty you called an apartment during your twenties? Congratulations! More than likely you will now buy a place during this decade and realize it kinda sucks to trash somewhere that you are going to bleed hundreds of thousands of dollars into.
What's that? You're like me and have no mechanical aptitude? You're about to get a crash course in fixing stuff with it's corollary skill of first aid (when you mess yourself up while fixing the aforementioned broken stuff). Good times!

PHYSICAL ATROPHY
Unless you have a plan to stay physically fit or are a genetic mutant you will get fat. That's all there is to it.

And the topper...

CHILDREN

Men lure themselves into a delusional pit of repression when thinking about kids. Women have maternal instinct to blind them from the truth. Know what kids mean? A LIFETIME OF RESPONSIBILITY. They will always be your kids. You will always be their Mother or Father. Know that job you had in your twenties that fueled your partying here and abroad? It's now fueling their college fund, their food, their clothes.

Is there a light at the end of your thirties?
MAYBE.
From what I see the forties aren't as bad as your thirties.

Why?

You've become numb to it all.

Woo-Hoo! That's some advice from someone on the other side of their thirties!

1 comment:

Up to a certain point, you are a full-time parent. When the kids are young (under 18), you are on much of the time. After that, the time slowly becomes yours. Being the parent can mean pushing the "adult" child out into the world by being gradually unavailable. You are still a parent but by then it's a part-time job.